Q-tips
Q-tips is not an eco brand and makes no plastic-free claims, yet its flagship swab is genuinely paper-stemmed - the mass-market default quietly dropped the plastic stick a long time ago. The cotton is conventional (not organic), and some jumbo multipacks ship in a plastic tub, so it isn't the greenest swab on the shelf. But on the one question that defines this category - is the stick plastic - the everyday drugstore Q-tip already gives the right answer.
How clear are their specs?
Confirms the paper stick on packaging and the site, but says little about the cotton (conventional, non-organic) or the packaging material on larger packs.